For the 2020 crop year, the operational teams of Bolloré Transport & Logistics have processed 10,575 tonnes, or 940 TEU, of mangos via air and maritime transport. A partner of the mango industry, Bolloré Transport & Logistics guarantees the cold chain, right from the packing phase in hard-to-access production zones, through its logistics platforms located in Côte d’Ivoire (Bouaké, Ferké...

South African telecom operator Telkom announced on August 2 it is launching a new mobile financial service on the local market. The service is a funeral insurance offer in collaboration with the insurer Guardrisk. This investment is in line with the strategic reorientation adopted by Telkom to diversify its revenues to cope with the rapid fall in the fixed-line segment, which now represents only...

On 28 July 2020, the Director-General of the Port Authority of Cotonou (PAC), Joris Albert Thys (pictured), signed a note announcing the introduction of new fees as part of actions against maritime piracy, following a recent ministerial decree dated 13 July. According to this note addressed to shipping agents and consignees, the amount of the new fees varies, depending on whether the ships...

In 1960 Sudan had the same GDP as South Korea’s, and Zaire’s was the same as that of Taiwan. East Asian countries faced economic ruin as a result of the Second World War and the effects lingered for over a decade. Internal armed conflicts also reduced social development within countries in the region and eroded development gains achieved prior to the Second World War. Decades later however,...

Nigerian solar-powered Internet service provider Tizeti announced it has upgraded the capacity of its core network infrastructure to 100 Gbps. The operation involved upgrading the existing Gigabit fiber connection of its Points of Presence (POPs) in Lagos to 10Gbps and relocating from its operation data center to a world-class tier III data center. According to CEO Kendall Ananyi, the network...

The government of Namibia is negotiating $273 million in aid from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to finance its spending. The information was reported last week by finance ministry spokesperson Tonateni Shidhudhu (pictured).  “We applied to the IMF last week. We will assess the terms and conditions to see if they are favorable to Namibia,” Tonateni Shidhudhu said. The...

Marieme Esther Dassanou is the Coordinator of Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA) the African Development Bank’s flagship pan-African initiative, which aims to bridge the $42 billion financing gap facing women entrepreneurs in Africa. She previously led IFC’s Gender Secretariat's work on advancing women's inclusion in the insurance and financial sectors. In this...

An education project in Lesotho, financed by the African Development Bank and implemented between 2008 and 2016, has provided the country with new primary and secondary school infrastructure and teacher training to enhance educational quality, according to a recently published report by Bank. The Support to Education Quality Enhancement (EDUC III) project was financed by a grant of $9.3...

The village of Tsakhuma in the Vhembe district of South Africa’s Limpopo region is proof positive that communities can find solutions to their problems. Like many rural areas in South Africa, Tsakhuma lacked access to water for bathing, cooking, washing and chores, and the burden of fetching water fell on its girls and women. “There was a general water shortage all over Tsakhuma,” says...

Côte d'Ivoire could be the country that will benefit the most from the African Continental Free Trade Area, the World Bank says in its recent “The African Continental Free Trade Area: Economic and Distributional Effects” report. The report found that Côte d'Ivoire has one of the largest trade costs on the continent and the implementation of the free trade zone would increase the nation’s...